


Synergy

by sherlokabriel



Category: Stardew Valley (Video Game)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Depression, Drug Use, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Misunderstandings, One-Sided Attraction, Recreational Drug Use, References to Depression, References to Sexual Situations, Sad and Sweet, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, two sad people being sad together
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 20:07:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29284260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sherlokabriel/pseuds/sherlokabriel
Summary: "When Lewis had told Marnie about the new farmer, he seemed excited that there would be fresh blood in Pelican Town. But what’s going to happen if the fresh blood is just as dead as the rest of the town?"The best thing Shane could hope for is that the new farmer stays far away from him. The best thing Cas could hope for is that leaving Joja to restore her grandfather's farm isn't as big of a mistake as it seems. The thing that these two people find in each other is a deep, resounding sense of understanding that they've never experienced before with anyone, and it's something they're going to have to confront no matter how much they're hoping to avoid it.
Relationships: Emily & Female Player (Stardew Valley), Harvey & Female Player (Stardew Valley), Lewis/Marnie (Stardew Valley), Sebastian & Female Player (Stardew Valley), Shane & Female Player (Stardew Valley), Shane/Female Player (Stardew Valley)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 13





	1. Shane

The first time Shane sees her is outside of Pierre’s on Friday, Spring 5th. It’s a fleeting glimpse, he doesn’t have the luxury to stop and care about the new farmer that’s made her way to bumfuck nowhere. He’s already running late for work, and Morris is not the forgiving type. In his periphery he sees the girl start towards him, trying to flag him down. Miscommunication, however, becomes his savior as Lewis, who thinks she is trying to talk to him, keeps her from approaching Shane. 

His day at Joja Mart is a blur, with the only remarkable thing that happens is when Morris reams him a new asshole for being three minutes late to work. Shane knows it’s no use arguing that technically, the punch clock doesn’t consider him late until ten minutes after his shift starts, so he sits there and takes it. He hates himself for sitting there and taking it, but he likes having cash more than he hates being a spineless idiot.

He punches out at exactly 5:03 as per Morris’s orders, changes out of his Joja uniform, and breezes past the redheaded cashier who he’s certain has never said anything other than how much gold a product costs. He can never remember her name, but he feels it’s something like Barbara or Brenda...or Denise. As he makes his way to The Stardrop he hears the flickers of conversations, about half of which seem to be focused around the new farmer in town. He remembers Marnie talking about the old farmer fondly, how Lewis and the farmer were always close. According to Marnie, the new farmer is his granddaughter or something. He didn’t care that much to remember exactly what she had said.

He pushes open the saloon doors and makes his way to the bar. Gus, a portly man with a large mustache, gives him a broad, friendly smile.

“Hey, Shane! Good to see ya,” Gus says, already pouring him a mug of beer.

“Gus,” he nods curtly, sitting down on a stool at the bar, “D’you decide to give Emily the night off or something?”

Gus shakes his head, “It’s Friday, Shane. You know better than to ask that. She’s just running a little late. I’m not gonna fault her for that.”

Shane lets out a huff of a laugh and shakes his head as his mind flashes back to Morris, face as round and red as a tomato and showering Shane in spit, “Fuck Gus, I wish you were my boss.”

Gus laughs and sets the pint on the table in front of Shane, “Well, you and Pam are here often enough that I could make you bartenders, but I’m worried the drinks wouldn’t make it to the customers. Do you want me to make you a pizza while I’m at it?”

“Nah, I’m good. But thanks.”

“Suit yourself.”

“Gus!” Emily says, bustling into the saloon. She seems to be a little winded as she makes her way behind the bar, “I’m so sorry I’m late! I got caught up talking to Cas! She ran an errand for me and I had to look for my coin purse so I could pay her but then I realized that Haley had taken a some and--”

“Emily, it’s fine. We haven’t hit the rush yet. The only person here at the moment is Shane,” Gus says at the same moment as the door opens and shut again, “And now Pam.”

“You sound disappointed, Gus. And here I thought I was your best customer,” Pam scoffs as she hobbles her way to her usual spot on the side of the bar. 

“You’d be my best customer if you actually paid your tab,” Gus mumbles under his breath. He starts to pour her a pint. Shane has always had a hard time being around Pam, the same way Ebenezer Scrooge would have a hard time being around the Ghost of Christmas Future, and he always makes a point to move to the other side of the bar next to the fireplace.

Slowly the place starts to fill up and his glass empties, and by the time half of the Friday regulars show up he’s asking for another pint. It's almost like clockwork, almost like playing a drinking game with himself where he’s not entirely sure what the rules are but he’s thinking it involves counting the number of people that come in. And just like every night, none of the patrons really talk to him. Not even Marnie talks to him, even though she knows he’s here every night. She’s too busy flirting with Lewis to notice the bustling saloon around her.

“Have you had a chance to meet Cas yet?” Emily asks after placing his fifth pint on the counter. Shane has noticed the new farmer move about the saloon, introducing herself to some of the other townsfolk. He wonders what she has heard about him, and if what she's heard is why she is chatting up everyone else before him. 

_Hopefully they’ve told her I’m an asshole_ , he thinks, _it’ll save her the trouble of finding it out on her own _.__

__“Nope,” he says, taking the beer and hoping that Emily will catch on that he couldn't care less about the new farmer._ _

__“She seems really helpful. I think you might like her, Shane.”_ _

__“Doubt it,” he mumbles before taking a long drink._ _

__He watches as she finally walks up to him. Her hair is dyed a light, spring green and reaches her shoulders, making the green that's speckled in her hazel eyes stand out a little bit more. She did have a kind, easy-going demeanor about her, but for some strange reason the only thing that seems to stick out about her was that she looks tired._ _

__“Hey Emily,” the farmer says with a soft smile on her face._ _

__“Cas! Thank you so much for running that errand for me! Shane and I were just talking about you and how great it’ll be to have you in the community. I don’t think you’ve had the chance to meet each other, though.”_ _

__Emily gives Shane a look that asks that he plays along._ _

__“Oh. Uhh no, we didn’t. I was going to this morning, but Lewis wanted to have a word with me,” the farmer says, rubbing the back of her neck before extending it out to him, “The name’s Casandra, but I'd rather go by Cas if it's all the same to you.”_ _

__Shane nods, eyeing her up and down quickly, not allowing himself to let his gaze linger on her any longer than necessary. He then finishes his beer, and places the empty glass on the table._ _

__“Tell Gus I’ll pay off my tab Monday, would you?”_ _

__Emily wears a confused expression on her face, her eyes darting between the farmer and Shane, “Uhh....yeah….sure Shane, I can do that. But don't you want t--"_ _

__He heads towards the door, shoulder checking the farmer as he leaves. It’s not intentional, but he doesn't apologize. He keeps walking out the door into the brisk spring night._ _

__It's not that he doesn't think the new farmer is worth his time. Well, it's a little bit of that. She seems nice enough to him, seems like someone he could get to know objectively speaking. But he doesn't want to allow her the opportunity to get to know him. He's not sure if it's for her sake or his own, but he's certain it's for the best._ _

__By the time he makes it back to Marnie's he's decided that what he had at the bar wasn't nearly as much as he would have liked. He enters the house, walks through the storefront to his room, and fishes out a six pack he's stowed under his bed. It's cheap Joja brand beer that tastes like something close to watered down piss, but he still drinks it. He's never been a man of very discriminating tastes._ _

__By beer four out of his six-pack, Marnie comes home. He can hear her giggling in the front and shushing a voice that he knew was Lewis. They sound like teenagers, trying to keep quiet so as not to wake the parents up as they make their way to her bedroom._ _

__He sighs and lays down on the bed, staring at the ceiling with his hands holding the pillow against his ears, hoping to drown out some of the thoughts in his head and the occasional moan from the other room that's louder than what the owner of it anticipated. He hates how Lewis treats Marnie, and hates how Marnie somehow thinks that she's being treated right by him. He can count on one hand the girls he's dated, and even though none of them worked out he never felt that they had to be his dirty little secret. He's been more aloof in one or two of those relationships than the others, sure, but this is different. This feels heinous._ _

__He thinks back to the farmer and her "quest" to introduce herself, hoping to drown out the passion from the other room. It was no secret that Lewis put her up to that; he made sure to announce it to everyone in town that she would probably make her rounds and meet everyone. He thinks back to how tired she looked with just a week of being on that farm, and he wonders how long she can keep up attempting to please everyone. The circles under her eyes were so dark, they almost looked like someone had beaten the shit out of her. If she didn't live alone on that farm and didn't know the people of Pelican Town well enough, he might have thought someone did. Just what does that farmer think she can accomplish on that run down piece of land anyway? No one had been out there since her grandfather died. No wonder she looked so tired, but it wasn't just a physical tired he noticed. She seemed...almost disillusioned._ _

__He realizes he's thinking too much. Beer five, he assures himself, should start to fix that. He sits up and frees another can off the pack. He pops open a can with one hand and chugs the entire thing._ _

__It's after one and a half packs are gone, when the room starts to spin and he has something tangible he can blame for the sick feeling he can never quite shake, he knows he's hit the sweet spot. He can’t seem to get the farmer out of his head, though, no matter how hard he tries. She was pretty, at least from what he can remember about her, but it’s not so much that that keeps drawing his attention to her. It was that there was something about her, something inside her that he was sure no one else has probably caught yet, that resonated with him. It was as if he saw a piece of himself in her, a piece that he hadn't seen in anyone else in this town._ _

__When Lewis had told Marnie about the new farmer, he seemed excited that there would be fresh blood in Pelican Town. But what’s going to happen if the fresh blood is just as dead as the rest of the town?_ _

__He will think a little bit more, but this will be the last concept he remembers thinking about before he blacks out._ _


	2. Cas

It is Spring 20th when Casandra realizes that what her grandfather left her wasn’t a fresh start, but rather, to put it nicely, a fucking garbage fire.

She doesn’t know how she’s going to break even this season. She doesn’t have the room on the property to make any substantial fields because the entire property hasn’t been touched since her grandfather passed away. Maple, oak, and pine trees take up over eighty percent of the property. On her first day's scope of the land she twisted her ankle on some bramble and debris. She limped all the way to the doctor’s office in town, which the doctor strongly discouraged but prescribed something for the pain. The pain was gone by that Wednesday, but she reluctantly adhered to the doctor’s orders and avoided strenuous labor for the full seven days, and so rather than clearing out space she spent most of that first week introducing herself in town.

She has some money to get through today, though, to pay off some expenses she has and for her prescriptions, which the local doctor was nice enough to have shipped in from the city, but as of today she has about a thousand gold to her name.

She heads to town around two o’clock and spends about two hundred gold on parsnip seeds from Pierre’s. Pierre has also been somewhat helpful, letting her in on the secret that potatoes grow fast and the townsfolk are willing to spend a pretty penny on them. She tells him that she’ll keep it in mind for tomorrow when she has a little more money. 

She stops at Dr. Harvey’s office and picks up her medication. She thinks that he’s a little awkward but overall a good guy. The moustache kind of throws her off, though, because to her he seems too young to be wearing a moustache. He tries to make small talk before bringing up that it might be a little more expensive for her to be on her antidepressants and sleep regulating medication than what she’s used to because the shipping costs are a little steep. He does seem to be genuinely regretful about the price hike, and she knows she’s better with her medication than without it. She agrees, and hands over three hundred fifty gold.

She decides to offer some of the plants she’s found to the Junimos in the community center, and by the time she finishes it’s sometime around five. It’s been a long day, and she has saved just enough gold to get her a beer at the Stardrop.

The saloon is quieter compared to what it was the night before, but it’s still busy. The air is abuzz with the sounds of various kinds of conversation. She swings by Elliot and Leah’s table to chat for a little. They ask her how the farm is, and she shrugs and lies through her teeth saying she can’t complain. They take it at face value and seem happy for her. She talks to Marnie, and Marnie seems excited to discuss plans for animals she owns. They talk about chickens for a little while, and Marnie says she’s willing to sell Cas chickens at a good price when she’s ready and has a place for them.

Marnie casts her glance over to the man standing by the fireplace, “Shane’s really been enjoying taking care of the chickens, even if he won’t admit it. I think it helps him take his mind off things.”

“Shane?” Cas asks, instinctively rubbing the shoulder he bumped into the night she introduced herself to him.

“My nephew. He’s been in a bit of a rough patch recently, so I offered my home to him and Jas. I told him he could stay for free until he gets on his feet, but he insisted on paying rent.”

“That’s sweet of you to do. Of both of you to do,” Cas says, with a soft smile.

“He’s a good kid. A little lost as of recently, but it happens to us all eventually. I just wish he had more friends, though. It’s sad that he thinks he has to be alone all the time. Especially on his birthday.”

“It’s his birthday today?” Cas asks, glancing over in his direction. He’s leaning back against the wall, his gaze still on his drink. He looks rough, more so than what he did when she had first met him. Cas wonders if he's been sleeping or eating well at all.

She nods and takes a drink from her glass. After talking for a few more minutes, Cas excuses herself. She moves towards the bar by where Shane is sitting.

“Hey,” Cas says, a tentative smile on her face.

“Why are you talking to me?” he asks bitterly, “I don’t even know you.”

Cas shrugs and points at the stool next to him, “Is this seat taken?”

He doesn’t say anything, and Cas takes his lack of an answer as a “no”. She pulls out the stool and sits down with her back towards Shane. After topping off the drinks of those around the bar, Emily finally makes her way to Cas.

“Hey, Cas. How’s the farm?”

“Can’t complain,” she sighs, “But I could really go for a beer right now, please.”

“Comin’ right up,” Emily chimes and makes her way to the tap.

There’s silence between Cas and Shane, but for some reason Cas doesn’t find it uncomfortable. She doesn’t find the need to force a pleasant demeanor onto him, because in her experience he’s never felt the need to be pleasant to her. She places her head in her hands and closes her eyes for just a little while.

Emily comes back with Cas’s beer and sets it on the bar, it’s contents sloshing ever so slightly over the side. Emily apologizes, but Cas shrugs it off and places her gold on the counter. Emily asks if she’s alright, but before Cas could answer the question Pam calls Emily over to serve her. 

And again, the only thing that fills the bar is the music from the jukebox and the murmurs of other conversations. Cas can feel Shane’s eyes on her from behind as she stares into her drink. She didn’t really need the beer as much as she thought she did. At least, she doesn’t need the drink. She needed to decompress, and just being around someone who doesn’t expect her to be talkative has helped a bit. 

“Here,” she says after a while, swiveling around in her chair and handing Shane her mug, “Happy Birthday. You look like you need it more than I do.”

He glances between her and the drink with a confused look on his face, and she laughs quietly. She doesn’t know why the fact that he’s looking at her like there’s some sort of catch is making her laugh, but it's freeing. It's earnest and honest and genuine, and she hasn't laughed like this in a few weeks. 

He still doesn’t say anything. He looks a little angry with her for laughing at him, but she tries her best to answer his concerns, “I didn’t spit in it, if that’s what you’re worried about. I didn’t even drink from it.”

Shane hesitantly takes the drink from her hand, “Umm...thanks, I guess.”

“Don’t mention it,” she says and pulls herself off of the stool with a groan, “I’ll see you around, Shane.”

She doesn’t give him the opportunity to ask her to stay, not that she thinks he’ll ask her anyway. Instead, she says goodbye to Emily and Marnie, and heads out into the night.


	3. Shane

Shane doesn’t talk to Cas again until the Flower Dance, but she has been on his mind a lot since his birthday. He was a little upset that Marnie had told the farmer it was his birthday, but the gesture of buying him a beer was kind. And her laugh was really pretty...and her smile was nice…and...and...

And he’s impressionable when he’s drunk.

He’s sure that that’s the only reason he’s thinking about her that much. He was drunk, not drunk enough to forget but not sober enough to see the pity in her actions if it was there. He’d been overanalyzing it so much that he couldn’t tell what her intentions were anymore, and he hasn’t had the opportunity to ask. He’s seen her duck into Pierre’s to grab potatoes to plant, seen her around the old community center, seen her lend a hand to Evelyn in the community garden, seen her play pool by herself at the Stardrop. He can’t bring himself to ask her about it, though.

He can’t bring himself to ask her because he doesn’t want there to be any catch to her actions. It’s been so long since he’s received any sort of kindness from someone who wasn’t supposed to be kind or who didn’t feel financially obligated to be kind. Gus treats him like a friend because he’s one of his best paying customers. Emily treats him like a friend because her job depends on it. Marnie treats him kindly because she’d do anything for her family, even if her family is a lowlife with a dead end job in a small town. And Jas...Jas is a kid and has no one else to look up to. 

But he sees Cas at the Flower Dance. She’s hopping from person to person, talking to them about the weather, asking a few people to dance. He can tell that she’s being rejected a lot, not only because she’s still trying to find someone but because she’s trying really hard to convey a carefree body language. He can hear her say things like, “No that’s fine”, “I just thought I’d ask”, and “Don’t worry about it, I hope you enjoy the dance!” She reaches him, and he can tell she’s disheartened. He doesn’t quite understand why she seems that way. She shouldn’t have expected anything else.

“Hey, that looks good,” she says to no one in particular and grabs a plate.

“It's excellent,” he replies to her, “But if you’re not a fan of spice, be careful. That green stuff is pretty hot.”

She gives him a confused look, but that look quickly fades into a soft smile. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks,” she says as she puts some food on her plate. He notes how pretty her smile is even without having to be incredibly drunk to notice it, and in his distraction he bites his cheek.

“Ow! Damn it.”

“Are you alright?” she asks as she tries not to laugh. 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he says, a little more gruff than he intended. She suddenly becomes very interested in filling up her plate and doing whatever she can to avoid making eye contact.

A few brief moments of silence passes before she sighs, “So listen, I really don’t know how the Flower Dance works, but I was wondering if maybe you wanted to...I dunno...dance with me? It’s fine if you don’t, but I just thought that if you didn’t have someone we could dance as...I dunno...acquaintances I guess? But like...no pressure or anything...”

He feels a little bad for her. He knows that she’s doing this mainly to be included in the goings of the town, or because Lewis put her up to it. He knows that she's been rejected by every single person that she has asked to dance. However, he doesn’t feel bad enough to accept her offer.

“No.”

“Oh--”

“What I mean is,” he stammers, for some reason feeling compelled to clarify, “I’ve already been asked. So like...thanks I guess, but no.”

“Oh okay. That’s fine. Just figured I’d ask, you know? I uhh...I hope you enjoy yourself, though,” she reassures with a nervous laugh. It’s not the same as the laugh he heard at the saloon on his birthday, and it makes his stomach feel sour.

“Thanks. Uhh...you...you too.”

He catches glimpses of her as he dances with Emily. She’s leaning against a tree with her arms crossed and her foot resting on the trunk as she watches the dance. She doesn’t seem to be fully present. She seems to be spacing off or thinking about something. It's like her body is here but her thoughts are far away from this hollow in the woods. She seems somber and a little lonely, the way he probably appears to everyone else when he’s at the saloon. He feels something tug at his heart, something like guilt or empathy. Probably both, but he can't decide for sure. He makes eye contact with her, and he catches a soft smile on her face before he has to spin around.

When the dancing is over, Marnie rushes over to him with Jas in tow. He hates the circumstances that caused Jas to come into his care, but he would steal every star in the sky for her.

“You did such a good job! I’m so glad you got yourself out there and got out of your comfort zone!” Marnie coos, standing on her tiptoes to smoosh his face in her hands and giving him a tight hug, “And you clean up so well! I could hardly recognize you out there!”

“Thanks Aunt Marnie,” he mumbles, hugging her back with not nearly as much enthusiasm. He turns to look at where Cas was standing and she was gone. He turns towards where the trail starts and sees her start to head home, but he doesn’t go after her. Instead, he scoops up Jas in his arms.

“Did you see me, Uncle Shane? Did you see me?” Jas pesters. 

Shane laughs and ruffles her hair, “‘Course I did, Jas! You were wonderful. You’re gonna be the best Flower Queen when you get older.”

Jas continues to talk about the dance as they make their way home, babbling on about how pretty Haley was and what she would do as Flower Queen. She tells them that when she’s Flower Queen, everyone will line up to weave flowers in her hair and toss flowers in the air so she can dance under them as they fall to the ground.

“I do wish Cas had more fun,” Marnie says with a lofty sigh, “She looked pretty lonely there. And that’s not a way to spend a Flower Dance. Did you ever ask her to dance, Shane?”

He swallows hard, thinking about how she asked him and he turned her down. He decides that that feeling that hasn't left him is most likely guilt, because it keeps bubbling up every time he thinks about telling her no. 

“Emily had already asked me like she does every year," Shane dismisses, "I couldn’t just turn her down to dance with someone else.”

“Next year you should think about asking her if she doesn’t have anyone else to dance with. She should feel included in celebrations now that she’s a part of Pelican Town.”

“We’ll see, Aunt Marnie.” Shane says. She seems happy with that response, and Shane’s relieved. He doesn’t want to talk about it because he’s worried that if he does he’ll tell them too much. He worries if she presses further he'll tell them how he sees something in her that he can’t quite name, something he sees in himself when he looks in the mirror but has never seen in anyone else in this town.

They reach the ranch, and he can see the back of Cas's spring green head heading towards the farm.

“Hi Miss Cas! Happy Flower Dance Day!” Jas calls towards her, gaining some confidence with the help of being carried in Shane’s arms. The farmer turns, flashes a genuine smile, and waves at Jas before continuing to walk home.

Shane watches as she follows the road that leads to her farm, kicking a couple of rocks out of her way. She seems to be taking her sweet time, and he has a powerful urge to chase after her, to talk to her. He wants to ask her how she’s able to handle everyone denying her the opportunity to get to know them better and still remain positive about it. He wants to ask her how she deals with being unwanted, how he can get better at being okay about it. He wants her to know that he gets it, that he understands, and that he’s sorry he’s been so hard on her but he’s forgotten how to be anything but abrasive to people he’s not related to. He wants to apologize about the way he's been acting, about turning her down, about not thanking her for showing her that flicker of kindness on his birthday.

But instead he lets the weight of what's left unsaid hang in the heavy evening air as he watches her walk up the hill. He lets out a deep sigh and wanders to Marnie’s front door. He lets Jas down onto the creaky floorboards as she runs to her room to play, but not without giving him a hug. 

He shuts the door to his room, sits on the bed, and pulls out another case of those shitty Joja Mart beers, knowing it won’t make him feel any better but desperately trying nonetheless.


	4. Cas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note 3/5/21: So I realized I had been referring to Robin as Jodi so I went through and fixed it. Sorry for the confusion!

Cas spends a lot of her free time wandering through the mountains when she’s finished her work on the farm. Now that it’s summer she’s been picking sweet pea and wild grapes. She’s been fishing at the lake, catching a lot of perch and the occasional largemouth bass. She talks to Linus sometimes, the hermit who lives in a tent behind Robin and Demitrius’s house, and gives him some of the fish she catches and the fruit she picks. He still doesn’t trust her, and she can’t blame him, but she can tell he appreciates not having to find food for himself all the time. He doesn’t say much, but he mentions how impressed he is of her getting in touch with nature in one way or another.

If she stays in the mountains through lunch, Robin will sometimes bring her a sandwich or a salad, and they’ll have lunch together under the shade of an oak tree. Cas suspects that she’s trying to set her up with her son, Sebastian, despite Robin claiming otherwise. On the few times that Robin successfully brings Sebastian out of the basement, they do have nice conversations. They enjoy the same genre of books, and he gives her a couple of his graphic novels to read.

She has met with Sebastian and his friends the past two Friday nights at The Stardrop to play pool. He admitted to Cas that he invited her in hopes that she was an even match for Sam, but Sam is afraid to play against her now, and Abigail outright refuses to play. She’s always been pretty good at pool, and last week she managed to hustle a can of Joja Cola out of Sebastian after he assumed it was going to be easy to beat her.

Tonight, however, Sam comes up with the idea to play doubles.

“C’mon it’ll be great,” Sam says, nudging Cas with his elbow, “Guys versus girls.”

“Pass,” Abigail says, not looking up from her new pack of tarot cards.

“Okay then,” Sebastian says, resting an arm on Cas’s shoulder, “Guys versus you.”

“I don’t think you understand the premise of ‘doubles’,” Cas says, raising an eyebrow.

“Why don’t you ask someone else in the bar? Maybe Leah would like to play?” Abigail suggests, still not bothering to look up from her deck. Cas looks over into the main room of the saloon. She can see Shane watching them from his spot as he drinks by himself, and the moment his eyes make contact with hers he looks away.

“What about Shane?” Cas suggests, “D’you think he knows how to play?”

Sebastian and Sam exchange a look. Cas has been impressed with how often they seem to be on the same wavelength. She knows they grew up together, but it’s almost as if they could be twins.

“You could ask him,” Sam tentatively says, “But if I’m being honest I’ve never seen him move outside of his spot.”

Cas squeezes between the two of them and stands at the threshold of the arcade room, “Hey! Shane!”

He looks at her, shocked that she’s acknowledging him to this degree. 

“We’re playing doubles and I could use someone on my team. You want in? You don’t even have to be good. Yoba knows Sam’s not.”

“Will you guys stop telling people how bad I am?!” Sam yells from behind her.

Shane remains quiet for a little while, and Cas starts to think that it’s going to be a “no”. She opens her mouth, but before she could tell him that he doesn’t have to worry about it, that she thought she would ask just in case, Shane does something that Cas isn't expecting.

“Sure, I’ll play,” he says, a little too quickly considering the amount of thought he seemed to have put into the decision. He picks up his beer and moves towards the arcade. Cas is a little shocked as well, but she tries not to make a big deal out of it. Everyone else doesn’t hide their surprise, though. Cas even catches Emily looking in her direction with a stunned awe that says, “What did you do to get him to move?”

Shane sets his beer on a table and Cas hands him a cue.

“Have you played before?”

“What did you think I did all through college?” Shane replies. He smiles a little as he says that, and Cas starts to wonder how drunk he is, or how drunk he has been in the past and what changed this time.

“Well, well, well, look who became a comedian,” Cas mumbles to him, grinning from ear to ear. She turns to Sam and Sebastian and makes her way to the table. “Rock Paper Scissors to see who breaks?”

“I...actually have a D4 in my pocket that might work better,” Sebastian says, digging into the pockets of his hoodie.

“Do you keep the full set on you at all times or just the D4?” Cas asks.

“I...you know what? I’m not gonna answer that, Little Miss Judgmental,” Sebastian huffs before pulling out a red and black D4 from his pocket. “Sam is one, Shane is two, I’ll be three, and Cas is four.”

The die is rolled, and Shane’s number comes up first. She watches as Shane steps up to the table as Sebastian sets it up. He leans in, lining up the pool cue and closing his right eye for accuracy. Cas didn’t think he’d show up with this much seriousness. Hell, she didn’t think he’d show up at all.

He gives it a nice, clean break and sinks a striped ball into a corner pocket.

“Shane and I are stripes, I guess,” Cas beams. He doesn’t acknowledge her as he gets up and moves over to where the cue ball has stopped. He sinks another two striped balls before he has to relinquish his turn to Sebastian.

“I think the odds might be stacked against us, Sam,” Sebastian pouts as he steps up to the table.

Shane goes back to the table to drink from his glass for a little while. Cas decides to stand next to him and enjoy some of the silence as Sebastian and Sam bicker back and forth. She takes this time to glance over at Shane. She thinks that blue and green are colors that really suit him.

“Cas! You’re up.” Sebastian says with a heavy sigh. Cas smiles, and makes her way to the table.

The fifteen ball was easy to sink; Sebastian had lined it up perfectly for her. Eleven and twelve managed to be side by side, so they were also a little easier for her to pick off. Those were the only three she manages to score, however, and it’s not long before it’s Sam’s turn.

“Hey,” Cas says to Shane, “I’m planning on grabbing a beer for myself. Do you want one?”

“Sure, I guess. But only if you’re planning on getting one yourself and not give me yours,” he says. His voice doesn’t hold the same gruff tone it usually does. It’s like it was when he told her about the food at the Flower Dance. It was unguarded and casual, like he wasn’t trying to hide behind anything.

She goes to the bar and asks Emily for two beers. She smiles wide and goes to the tap and pours out two beers in frosty mugs. When she comes back, she looks over to the arcade room and then back at Cas.

“How’s it going in there?”

“Not bad, I think. It seems like he’s enjoying himself, but I can’t really tell. I’m honestly not sure why he would want to. I always kind of figured he didn’t like me.”

“I honestly didn’t think he’d accept your offer, either, but I’m really glad he did,” Emily says.

“Yeah,” Cas says, she turns her attention to the pool table where Shane is taking his turn. She watches as he leans over the table, lining up the shot. He seems lighter than what he did before, like a weight has been momentarily lifted from him. “Yeah, I’m glad he did, too.”

Shane and Cas win one round and lose another before Sam, Sebastian, and Abigail have to head home. Cas gives each of them a warm farewell, with Abigail insisting she gets a hug from Cas. When they leave, it’s just Shane and Cas. Again, a silence falls over the two of them. This silence feels a little more uncomfortable to Cas than the one they shared on his birthday, so she decides to break it.

“Listen,” Cas begins clumsily, “Thanks for joining us tonight. I know it’s not what you had planned, but--”

“No problem,” he says, cutting her off. “I had fun. Honestly.”

He starts to head back to his spot in the bar, but before he leaves the threshold she speaks out.

“Do you want to play another round?”

She notices that she sounds a little too eager, and she hates it. She can hear the nervousness in her voice, hear every note of desperate energy carrying in her voice. She doesn’t quite know why she’s trying so hard to be friends with him. She’s never really cared about making friends before. Why is this guy, who didn’t even acknowledge her when she introduced herself, different from anyone else? He shouldn’t be different, but she somehow feels connected to him. She feels like he gets her on some level, but something that they always seem to dance around that feeling whenever they’re around each other.

“I’ll take a rain check,” Shane says with a gentle smile. It feels warm and genuine to her. “But thanks. Really.”

“Yeah! Sure! N-no problem,” She says, rubbing the back of her neck. She moves around him and heads towards the bar, “I should actually head on home anyway. I’ll see ya around, Shane.”

She walks to Emily and pays for the two beers she had gotten, then walks out of the saloon into the balmy, summer night. 

She wonders, on her walk home, if he sees something in her, too. She wonders if he looks at her and feels like he’s not alone in all this loneliness and fear. 

She wonders if it’s selfish to feel this way. It’s not like she expects him to fix her, or vi se versa. That’s not what she wants from him. What she wants is to be able to tell the truth around someone, to tell someone what’s bothering her and know that they would approach it with understanding. She wants to be able to tell someone she feels better than she has in a while, but quitting her job at Joja didn’t fix everything like her grandfather said it would. She wants to be able to tell someone that leaving everything behind and getting a fresh start isn’t an automatic reset on your mind; the fear and the dread and the inadequacy doesn’t go away the moment you’re outside of the city limits. She wants to be able to tell someone that there’s always been a part of her that wishes she could be spatchcocked so she doesn’t have to feel so hollow on the inside anymore. She wants to be able to tell this to someone without having to be hospitalized every damned time.

Cas makes her way to the farm and shuts the door to her house. It still smells a little musty after all this time, but it’s slowly becoming her own. She collapses on the bed and stares at the ceiling, letting her thoughts have free reign until she falls asleep.


	5. Shane

Shane is the first one to find the farmer asleep somewhere other than her bed.

Insomnia is a funny thing for Shane. He doesn't know when it will come or why it comes, but it prickles up at the base of his skull and bubbles until it sloshes behind his eyes, and even though he does feel tired he can't find sleep. It happens a few times out of the year, and when it does it leaves Shane stumbling out the back door to pass the time until his brain decides it's ready to power down for the night. Sometimes he wanders around the forest, up to the same spot the flower dance is held every year, or to the cliffs in the Cindersnap Woods before the ocean meets the river. Other times he wanders into the mountains or to the beach. Sometimes he doesn't have a clue where his feet move him.

This was one of those nights, the kind where he didn’t know where he was going but just knew he needed to move. He also doesn't know why Cas is curled up on the cobblestone in the middle of the town square on this balmy summer night. He didn't take the farmer to be a black out drunk, but aside from alcohol he's clueless as to why she’s asleep here. He could tell that she was still breathing, and it seemed to be without any underlying issues. She just seems to have fallen asleep here of all places. 

He starts to walk away from her and head up towards the mountains, but he doesn't even make it past Pierre's before a small tug at his heart is pulling him back, accompanied by a small voice in his head:

_You can't just leave her in the gutter like that. She's better than that. She's better than you._

He lets out an annoyed sigh and makes his way back towards her. He kneels down to get a closer look, noting how cool the cobblestone was against his bare knees, and he sees that her face is scraped up a little. There's not much blood, which is good considering she might have possibly fallen onto cobblestone, but he figures this is still out of his range of expertise. Thankfully the doctor is only a few doors away.

He reaches the doctor office door. The powder blue of the doctor's office has turned to a rich violet in the night. Shane wonders if Harvey can even hear him knock on the front door since he lives on the second floor. After some deliberation, Shane knocks on the front door.

No answer.

 _Of course he's not going to answer_ , a louder voice in his head says, _it's the middle of the night. You're the only person who's ever consistently up this late...._

Slightly discouraged, Shane knocks again. And again. And again.

Finally Harvey opens the front door to the hospital with emerald robe haphazardly tossed over an old t-shirt and boxers with baby blue pinstripes. He takes his tortoise rimmed glasses and cleans them off on his robe before placing them on his face.

"Yoba, Shane, do you realize what time it is?" Harvey asks, “Couldn’t this have waited until I opened for the day?”

Shane clears his throat, "Listen Harvey, if it wasn't important I wouldn't be here, but I need some very quick medical advice."

Harvey sighs, pulling his bathrobe over his shoulders more, “Alright, fine. Come inside.”

“Actually,” Shane says, “It might be better if you come out here and follow me.”

Harvey raises an eyebrow, but in leu of an answer Shane leads him to the square where Cas is unconscious. He can hear Harvey utter a small curse under his breath. Shane watches intently as Harvey rolls her over and checks her vitals.

“She seems to be fine," Harvey says relieved, "she might have just fallen asleep.”

Shane scoffs, “A pretty stupid place to fall asleep, don’t you think? Why didn't she just go home?”

“She might not have had much of a choice,” Harvey sighs, “Once it hits a certain time her medication is bound to wear off…”

Shane looks at him with a confused expression and Harvey pinches the bridge of his nose. Shane frowns, suddenly feeling rather self conscious. He doesn’t hate Harvey, but he does hate what Harvey’s line of work does to a man like Harvey. He hates the knowitallism that comes with doctors, hates the smell of antiseptic that clings onto him and everything in that building, hates being cared about in a way that were he not paying them might suggest that they somewhat cared. It’s not Harvey’s fault that Shane hates Harvey. He’s sure under different circumstances, maybe if Harvey wasn’t a doctor or Shane wasn’t a college flunkie, they could be friends.

“I’m sure she wouldn’t want me telling you anything about her medical history,” Harvey says matter-of-factly, “The important thing is that she should be perfectly fine. She doesn’t need to stay under my care.”

“Well that’s a relief,” Shane says, somewhat sarcastically, “But what should we do with her?”

“Take her home, first off. I’ll write a letter so she knows what happened. It’s probably a good thing that you called on me, Shane. Had you gone to someone from Joja they might have charged her an arm and a leg to tell you the same thing I did.”

He decides to stay in his spot as Harvey rushes inside. He clears his throat a few times, hoping to dissipate the heavy, uncomfortable air that he’s made for himself by being too self-aware of how awkward this moment is. He glances from her to bits and pieces of the nearby scenery, refusing to let his gaze linger too long on just one thing to avoid being too creepy or too insensitive to no one in particular.

It seems like hours by the time Harvey gets back with a crisp envelope that looks purple in the dark. He hands it to Shane, and when Shane takes it he notices the signature doctor script scrawled out on the front with Cas’s full name.

“If you can leave this in her mailbox when you take her back--”

“Hold up there,” Shane huffs, holding his hand up to stop him, “Why do I have to take her back?”

Now it’s Harvey’s turn to scoff, “Do I look like I have any sort of physique capable of taking her back? I’m lucky to bench press eighty pounds--”

“Okay fine--” Shane cuts him off, “Fine, I’ll take her back. But you owe me one.”

“Considering you woke me up in the middle of the night for this, I think we’re pretty square.”

Shane stuffs the envelope back in the pocket of his cargo shorts and gently starts to maneuver her into his arms. It takes a little while, but he’s just glad that he doesn’t drop her. It’s not an action he’s unfamiliar with; he’s had to carry Jas to her room after she’s fallen asleep on the couch watching cartoons. She’s definitely bigger and more awkward to carry than Jas, and it’s much farther than what it would be to carry Jas to her room, but Shane assures himself that the concept is the same. 

After thanking Harvey for coming out to help, Shane starts to walk towards her place. He takes the paved road that leads out of town rather than going down by the ranch. He figures it will save her the embarrassment of letting the whole town know she passed out in the middle of the town square by taking the most direct route there. This village was so small it would have only been a matter of time before someone had heard about it and assumed the very worst.

The gentle lull of the crickets mingled with the sound of his worn shoes scraping against the gravel. It’s kind of soothing, and it helps distract him from his task. It hasn’t rained in a little while, so he’s been kicking up dust as he moves, but the air is humid and keeps the sweat clinging to his skin. He feels himself growing more and more tired as he makes his way to the farm. 

_Maybe I was meant to find her,_ he thinks, _in the same way that someone would give you a sleeping pill, the universe handed me this task so I would go the fuck to sleep._

He shakes his head to no one in particular. He believes it was a stupid thought with not enough to salvage from it to make a decent joke. 

It isn’t much longer before he reaches the farm. She’s definitely done a lot to make this farm work for her, and he's impressed. He could see in the moonlight that her crops are growing well but none of them are quite ready to harvest yet. He can see the dog she's taken in curled up on the porch. He remembers when Marnie first found that dog, how she asked Shane to help her lure him with some leftovers that were close to getting bad. He remembers how the dog wasted no time in scarfing down the leftovers and how affectionate the dog was after that. Shane hopes the dog remembers him and doesn't try anything sudden. 

He places his foot on the first step, and the old wooden planks let out a strained groaning sound. The dog lifts its head and gives Shane a low, testing growl.

“Hey boy,” Shane says softly, “I’m just bringing Cas home, okay?”

The dog seems to recognize Shane, and he starts to thump his tail excitedly before he pulls itself to his feet and saunters over to sniff Shane’s leg.

Shane, careful not to move too suddenly and wake the farmer, bends his knees and reaches for the handle. It takes him a couple of tries, but he eventually opens the door. Shane is a little unsure as to why Cas decided to leave her door unlocked, but since he didn't have a key he was grateful nonetheless. The dog is excited by this opportunity to no longer be stuck outside and happily bounds his way into Cas's little home.

The one room farmhouse is too dark to really see anything, but he can make out a few things in the dark. He can see an acoustic guitar in the corner next to a chest that she must have made. He can see a glass bottle of something and a small box the size of a deck of cards sitting out on the kitchen table next to a decorative bowl, but the label is facing away from him. It seems to Shane that she hasn’t allowed herself to make this place feel like home yet, and he finds himself pitying her. She’s been running around so much for other people, she hasn’t been able to take much time for herself.

Shane sets Cas on her bed. Her dog follows after her, gently hopping on the bed and circling around before lying down beside her. Her dog sniffs her hand and gives a few soft licks before resting his head down and closing his eyes. Shane smiles to himself as he witnesses Cas feel around the bed, patting gently until she finds the dog by her side and curls herself around him. And suddenly, Shane notices a sour sensation growing in the pit of his stomach. He finds himself guilty for staying this long, even though it’s only been just long enough to place her on the bed. This isn’t meant for him; this moment, this peace, this fracture of something he can’t seem to find nestled within the crevices of this old farm house. He feels like he is not meant to know this side of her at all, much less without her knowledge.

He also feels weird just leaving the door unlocked. Pelican Town is a small community, sure, and she has a dog, but it still feels wrong to leave her unprotected. He fumbles around in the dark, his large hands palming across the surfaces until he finds her keys. He quickly leaves the little shack, closing the door gently behind him. It takes a few moments of leafing through the keys until he finds the one for the front door, and clumsily locks it behind him. He crouches down. He hopes he can just slide the keys through the crack in the door, but it takes him lying down on her slightly warped porch for him to realize that her keys aren’t going to fit through the door. He pulls himself up off the floor, collecting a splinter in his now dust covered palms.

After a few setbacks his task is done. The farmer is safe at home, the note Harvey left for her in her mailbox, and her keys set neatly on top of the note. He still feels uncomfortable about the whole thing, and he makes a mental note to make the time to explain it to her later.

Shane starts his way back to Marnie’s place. He shuffles his feet, taking his time and kicking the stray pebbles that cross his path. The task of taking the farmer home has made him sufficiently exhausted, and he knows that he’ll have a good night’s rest before work in the morning. A thought slowly trickles into his head as he walks, filling the space that the scrapes of his soles on the gravel leave in the air; the farmer looks best when she is at peace. Sure, it was the tired, world weary expression in her hazel eyes that made him see a kindred soul within her, but when the weight was off of her shoulders and she knew the peace that came with sleep she looked so beautiful. That thought lead the way for other thoughts he tried to avoid the entire encounter to fill his mind; how he could smell the traces of her soap through the sweat and grime, how she made the slightest snoring sounds when he carried her, how she stirred once in his arms only to cling onto his old Joja sweatshirt just a little tighter and nuzzle her face into it, the way she felt so...so...comfortable. It was like she was comfortable around _him_ , and up until he became too aware of how undeserving he was to be that comfortable with himself, he had managed to find comfort in the idea of her.

Shane allows himself to get lost in thoughts of Cas long enough to make his way back to Marnie’s. He slips in through the back and shuts the door and catches a glimpse of the time. He remembers that he doesn’t have to work today, so he reasons that he should be fine if he sleeps in a little later as long as he explains to Marnie what happened. He collapses on his bed and closes his eyes. He thinks back to how empty Cas's house was, how it didn't even seem like she had let herself live in that space. He wonders if it's because she's not allowing herself to be happy here, or if he's just projecting that feeling onto her. He catches himself doing that a lot these days. Maybe he could mention it to her later, when he finds the time to talk to her about what happened tonight.

His last thought of the night his the hope of finding the same peace, safety, and comfort that Cas seemed to find in her slumber when he falls into his own.


End file.
